The House’s broad rejection of the massive farm bill has local farmers uncertain about future funding — regardless of their varying views of the measure.

This is lawmakers’ third try in as many years to push a farm bill through the House. The five-year, half-trillion dollar measure would have expanded some subsidies while saving about $4 billion annually overall, including a 3 percent cut in the almost $80 billion-a-year food stamp program.

The vote June 20 was 234-195 against the bill, with 62 Republicans voting no, arguing it was too expensive.

Bob DiCarlo, dairy manger and partner at Fa-ba Farms in Canandaigua is not concerned that the farm bill failed in the House. He believes subsidies may not be the answer when it comes to the long-term success of farms.

“Farm subsidies can stifle creativity because they can limit competition, and competition makes businesses better in any industry,” DiCarlo said, adding that challenges such as adverse market or weather conditions can result in creativity, efficiencies and resourcefulness.

Ryan Akin is president of the Ontario County Farm Bureau and farm manager at Hemdale Farms in Clifton Springs. He was hoping the farm bill would get a thumbs up. Of particular interest to him are the conservation programs through the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) — an agency of the USDA — that would benefit local farms but are unsure of future funding.

“They’re taking applications,” Akin said, “but are unsure of the availability of funding due to the lack of a current farm bill.”

“Having a safety net in place to protect us in the really bad times is crucial,” Akin said.

Akin’s friend and fellow farmer doesn’t agree, however.

“Yes, there are hard times,” DiCarlo said, “but if the restaurant on Main Street has hard times, they don’t expect the government to step in and offer subsidies.”

DiCarlo is in favor of some types of disaster assistance in cases of extreme floods or weather conditions. But on his farm, harsh weather has caused them to rethink their strategy.

“Over the past couple of years we’ve really focused on draining our land better, different crop rotations and alternative crops so we can harvest more off the land we have,” DiCarlo said. “We’ve focused on new technology.”

In the past, farm assistance programs and SNAP (formerly food stamps) have been tied together to prevent rural members of Congress from always voting against the largely urban SNAP program, and vice-versa.

Rep.Tom Reed, R-Corning, said there has been talk about separating the two, but he thinks the problems would remain.

“It highlights our differences, but we can work through them,” Reed said. By separating the programs, “you set up a split between the urban and rural that is not conducive to getting a bill passed.”

Page 2 of 2 - Reed said Congress has until Sept. 1 to work on a new farm bill before there will be pressure to pass a status quo extension of the 2008 bill.

The Senate overwhelmingly passed its version of the farm bill earlier in June, with about $2.4 billion a year in overall cuts and a $400 million annual decrease in food stamps — one-fifth of the House bill’s food stamp cuts. The White House was supportive of the Senate version but had issued a veto threat of the House bill.